


Quit While You're Ahead

by Querel (Rednaelo)



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Alternate Universe, Dom/sub Undertones, M/M, Mafiastuck, Parent/Child Incest, References to Abuse, Sibling Incest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-05
Updated: 2013-07-16
Packaged: 2017-11-13 15:11:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 10,223
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/504834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rednaelo/pseuds/Querel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dave finds that he can't hide from destiny in a closet. Destiny is a little too eager to put a gun in his hand.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Okay...well...don't tell anyone but, uh...this might be making a comeback. I don't really...know...why or how. But, uh.... Let's just say that this story here, while it does have a plot that's almost completely planned out, I'm kinda just doing whatever with it. So don't put too many of your expectations on it because it might die again one day. Um, hope you like?  
> -Querel

You don’t like him.  He’s spoiled and full of himself and thinks he can have every damn thing.  You know his type.  You’ve heard of them in legends and seen them clogging the hallways at your school, loitering around cars that Daddy bought and wearing clothes that Mommy paid for.  You were just trying to stay out of the way.  Just wait the whole thing out until Bro finally decided it was time to go home. 

You know why he brought you here.  But you don’t want to have a damn thing to do with it, which was why you gave him the slip as soon as you found an opening.  And it wasn’t the easiest thing.  You don’t just ‘give Bro the slip.’  It’s easier to try to pass through solid walls.  He may have plans for you, but they’re not your plans.  Running into that brat wasn’t your plan either.  But that’s what happened.

The collision was something straight out of a movie, complete with splattered punch and shattered crystal.  The only thing that wasn’t on the script was the way he looked at you after you bumbled out an apology and tried to side-step him.  It was that look that stopped you in your tracks.  You have no idea how he did it but somehow that douche managed to piss you off without even saying a word.

It was the look in his baby blue eyes that glittered at you from behind those square lenses that you were willing to bet money were designer brand.  Armani, maybe.  You don’t know; you don’t give a fuck.  He got punch on the sleeve of his gray sports coat but he wasn’t mad.  He was sneering at you.  Smirking.  You were trash.  He was better than you and for whatever reason, it was important that in that moment, you were aware of it.  That and he had some secret he wasn’t sharing.  It was hidden by those awkward teeth and curled lips.

“What, I’m sorry,” you repeated, trying to brush past him again.

“Bullshit.”  He was laughing at you.

You would’ve whipped around and flicked him off if you didn’t have better things to do with your time, like get as far away from Bro as you possibly could. 

You weaved between party guests—guys in tuxes and dames with gaudy dresses—until you managed to slip into the giant-ass mansion where this fucking soiree was set.  You had to bypass some nasty looking security to get there—tattoos and scars and guns where people could see them.  They let you by without a fuss but you definitely weren’t encouraged to go poking around too much.

As soon as you were safely inside, you knew you would get lost if you weren’t careful.  And you did not want to get lost in this place.  But you also didn’t want to make it easy for Bro to find you.  There were a few guests hanging about, so you maneuvered through them casually, following their trail to a banquet hall with an overflowing table.  You weren’t hungry; you didn’t want to eat anything.  Not off that table.  You didn’t trust it to even munch out of pure boredom.

You poked around until you found a bathroom and locked yourself in.  Opulent and needlessly impressive.  How many stories high was this fucking house anyway?  Like four?  They could make it a little more obvious what kind of person lived here.  You would’ve sat on the sink counter, but this closet had one of those super modern sinks that was a floating bowl supported by a minimalist fixture attached to the wall; the water just poured from a hole in the tile above the basin. You lowered the lid of the toilet and sat on that instead.

As you flicked through your cellphone, you calculated your chances of leaving this place with your wishes to remain unaffiliated intact.  You gave yourself a generous ten percent.  Fuck.  You hurriedly scrawled a text message to your friend Rez and told her you might not make it to next Monday.  If you were an idiot, you would’ve chucked your phone across the room in frustration.  But you knew your Bro would have your eye sockets for pinky rings if you kept breaking shit he bought for you. 

You camped out in that bathroom for at least a good hour, managing to avoid guests with legitimate bladder predicaments until some drunk came bashing on the door with promises to upchuck all over the carpet.  You weren’t going to be an accessory that cleaning bill, so you absconded quickly.  Which is when you ran into that douche again.

Only it was a little less literal the second time.  You stopped short of colliding with him when you actually quit glancing around to see if you were being watched and looked forward, like a normal person.  He was standing in your way.  Hands clasped behind his back and that shit-eating grin still stuck to his lips.  They were like girl-lips, so full…. 

“Walk much?” he asked you as you stumbled backwards to keep your foreheads from cracking together.

“Harhar, you’re hilarious,” you muttered before trying to maneuver your way around him again. 

“You’re Strider’s little bro, right?”

That’s when you knew you were fucked.  The only way this kid would know your Bro was if he were involved in the line of business.  There were other kids here about your age, but you figured they were all just sons and daughter of the vaguely associated politicians who fund this bullshit circus under the table.  The would have no need to know your Bro’s name unless they knew what was really up.

“What’s it to ya?” you asked, not turning around.

“I knew it. You look just like him.”

“Must be the shades; they’re from my mother’s side of the family.”

You listened to his footsteps shuffle gently against the carpet until he walked right past you, chuckling all the way.  Ha ha ha.

“It’s your voice, actually,” he said, pivoting to look you in the face again.  “You have that same, low kinda lulling murmur with the Southern snap to it.”  The smile grew wider and you grew wary.  “I wonder if you knew.”

“Not particularly, but it doesn’t really matter now, does it?” you said, annoyed.  You wished this kid would just leave you in peace.  You wanted even less to do with him after you realized that he could identify you.  That meant he could go straight to your Bro and fill him in.  It was time for another getaway.  Take two:  “Check ya later.”

“Sure.  See ya around.”

You desperately hoped not.  But you weren’t lucky. 

En route to find another hiding place, you almost walked right into your Bro.  Last minute, you ducked into a coat closet and avoided the confrontation that probably would’ve ended your everything.  You counted minutes after the footsteps fell away and only _then_ allowed yourself to breathe.  The relief smelled like mothballs, cigar smoke and lady’s perfume on velvet and mink.  You knew you couldn’t stay there all night, but it would do fine for what you needed.  You crawled to the furthest corner and found a little nook to give yourself a further advantage.  So you shed your jacket, pulled your earbuds from the pocket and settled there to zone out to some of your mixes while you waited for midnight to come around.

Not twenty minutes in, you were found.  You would’ve screamed in startled panic if not for the fact that it would’ve made you look like a total pussy and it would’ve given beaver teeth another reason to ridicule you.  He loomed over you like a grinning reaper.  You ripped the earbuds out and glowered at him.

“Dude, the fuck?” you sighed.

“You’re right on top of my stash, ‘dude,’” he smirked quietly as he crouched down next to you.  You furrowed your brow and scooted over so he could access his ‘stash’ or whatever the fuck he was talking about.  You watched with mild interest as he knocked against the mahogany panel that you’d tucked yourself against and popped it clean through.  You didn’t say or do anything, but inside you were trying to determine if you should’ve been freaking out.

He reached into the hole he just made and pulled out an old shoebox, sitting across/next to you once he’d retrieved his treasure.  You watched him as he shuffled around the contents for a bit, while you yourself put pieces together and eventually he produced a box of cigarettes and a lighter. 

“Want one?” he asked, opening the box for you.

“You stash cigarettes?” you asked him, reaching for one anyway.  “In a closet?”

“They’re from Austria,” he said, taking one for himself and sticking it between his lips before flicking the Zippo a couple times.  “And I like to keep a few of them scattered about the mansion for emergencies.”

“What’s your crisis?” you asked him, just out of curiosity. 

“I’m hard up for some action and there isn’t anyone here that’ll bite.” 

You were resolute and when he leaned in, you didn’t flinch at all but simply watched.  Watched as he touched the glowing tip of his cigarette to yours. When you pulled a breath, you flicked your gaze up to his eyes.  He was watching you back with that sly glittering.

It was only then that you actually assessed him in full.  He had a baby face, almost, but a strong jaw and dark eyebrows that were doing some suave expression that belonged under a fedora in a _noir_ flick.  He seemed to be about your age, but maybe was a bit younger.  He was just as tall as you, if not taller.  In the shadowy reds and ochers of the closet, his skin was darker and warm and he had big hands, piano fingers that held his cigarette gently.  His hair was blacker than the dark of his pupils and framed his face in one of those model-esque tousle styles.  On his left hand, middle finger, was a thick, gold ring set with a huge sapphire and his shoes were polished. 

“Got a name, Strider?” he asked you before settling back and taking a drag, eyes never leaving your face.

“It’s Dave,” you told him.  Your tongue brushed against the cigarette’s filter and brought back the sweet flavors of clove and tobacco.  “You?”

“John,” he said, extending a hand to you.  “John Egbert.”

That gave you pause.  You certainly didn’t let it show; you reached out your hand and shook his with a muttered ‘pleasure’ before taking it back again.  You weren’t allowed, though.  John Egbert decided he liked holding your hand and barely let you go before lacing his fingers with your and tugging you forward.

“Come on, man, what—”

“You’re my type, Dave,” he said, smiling at you with zero trace of shame.  “What do you say we go a few rounds?”

“You serious?”  Your exasperation was palpable.

“What, am I no good?  Your standards too high to fuck a mob baby?”  The grin he gave you was positively shark-like.  Fear wiggled through you like an electric pulse and vanished just as quickly as it appeared, suffocated under the haze of cigarette smoke that curled lazily from Egbert’s flared nostrils.  “Your brother’s certainly aren’t.”

Jesus shit.

You snatched the cigarette from his lips and crushed it between your fingers.  He laughed and stole yours instead, managing one last drag before you got angry and punched him in the mouth.  That just made him laugh even more.

You grappled and cursed at each other, tumbling around and colliding with walls and elbows and knees.  Fucker wouldn’t stop laughing.  And somehow in all of it, you managed to pin him down.  His glasses were askew.  Panting, you glared down at him as he smiled back up at you.  His bottom lip had a split in it.

Your first kiss with John Egbert had a lot of teeth in it.  Less of a kiss, more like an attempted maul.  Egbert just had ridiculous teeth to begin with and you were venting your frustration with ferocity.  He was eager enough, hips rocking up into yours.  You could feel him growing hard through the fabric of his slacks.

“I like your tongue stud,” he whispers when he gets the chance.  You ignore him.

You macked on him until you were sick of it.  And though he sounded angry when you got to your feet, when you jerked him up after you, he shut up again.  You slammed him against the wall and tore at the button of his pants while he did nothing but sit there and giggle at you.  So fucking irritating.  You swore that you were going to drag him down to a breathless panting bitch like he wouldn’t believe if only to get him to SHUT the FUCK UP.

So that’s where you are, your fingers gripping hard into the supple flesh of his ass as you hold him, grinding your dick hard against his.  And he hasn’t shut up, but he’s sputtering swear words every other breath as you lap at the cut on his lip.  Your fingers push at his hole every now and then and he whimpers at it.  But you’re not going in.  You don’t know what kind of whore this boy fancies himself but you’re not risking anything.  Not for a onetime hatefuck in the closet.

Speaking of which, someone opens the door and goes browsing through the racks.  You can hear them, but you don’t stop.  Just cover Egbert’s mouth with your own and clamp your teeth down on his tongue as you keep rocking him into the wall.  You watch his eyes widen when you pull away and purposefully give a little suckle to his bottom lip.  Your lips press against his ear and you tell him he’s a kinky fuck, getting off on the thrill of being caught.

“Do you want them to see?” you whisper to him as his cock twitches against you.  “You want them to see you frotting in the dark with pants around your ankles?”

“Fuck, Strider…!”

“Maybe next time, baby blue.”  His breath in your ear is hot and damp and you see the perfect spot on his neck to suck at.  The skin of his jaw is so smooth as you rub your face against it, digging your teeth into that vulnerable place.  The door shuts again.  You push your finger inside of him and he gasps.

A phone rings.  You’re thrown off your groove.  John blinks and then pushes you out and away, and you almost fall flat on your ass with your cock hanging out while he reaches down to where his slacks are bunched around his feet and pulls them back up.  You gape at him as he takes his cellphone out of his pocket.  His eyebrows flick up almost imperceptibly as he looks at the caller ID and then answers.

“Yes, Daddy?”

His hand—you watch it wrap around his cock and pump slowly as he listens to…did he say that was his father?  This is wigging you out more and more with each passing second but you are glued there, stunned.  What the hell happened to ‘going a few rounds?’ Well, John’s still there jerking off, eyeing you, so maybe this isn’t as over as you thought.  You figure you’ll join in.

You pick yourself up and assemble your composure before walking right back over to Egbert and giving him a sneer.  He shrugs with a guiltless grin and keeps listening to the voice on the phone as you get to your knees.  John says something into the receiver; you eye just how big and beautiful he is.  Damn.  He’s bigger than you are, and your length is pretty generous to begin with. 

You figure you can fantasize later.  You have a real moment now.  His cock is hot and velvety in your mouth.  You suck at the crown and look up at his face as your tongue traces the ridge of it.  His smile twitches down at you and he winks, curling his hand in your hair.  You probably wouldn’t put up with any sweet touches given the circumstances, but you don’t have it in you to brush him off.  The touch is reminiscent, familiar….  You allow yourself the indulgence.

“I know, Daddy, I will.”  His voice is low and gentle, like he’s trying casually pass off his bedroom voice as something suave.  You want to hear it break.  You want that composure to crumble; you were moments from it before….   If you could just…get him…to break….

You aren’t lacking a gag reflex, but you do possess an excellent deep-throating technique which you are more than willing to employ.  You swallow John to the root and he gasps, obviously not expecting it.  You bet not; how many people are able to do something like this for him.  Not many, if you had to guess.  His fingers tug on your hair as he struggles to even out his breathing.  You’ve got him.

“Yes, of course…”  John, finished with his call, puts the phone into his coat pocket and starts panting more audibly.  “Damn, Strider, where’d you get that mouth from?”  You hum to express your amusement and then go back to choking him down as best you can.  You wrap your hands around his plushrump and pull him deep into you. 

“Can I come on your face?”

You quirk an eyebrow up at him.  Deliberate and slow, you suction your lips around the shaft and pull back slowly, smacking your lips with a sharp suckle when you reach the head.

“Only if you lick it off afterwards.”

Cheshire grin and wicked twinkling in his eyes.  You have the looming feeling that his expression is going to haunt you for many nights to come.

“Deal.”

You get right back to it, deciding to be as agonizing and slow as you possibly can. John doesn’t seem to appreciate it.  That or he does quite a bit because his vocalizations become desperate.  You keep a good pace, unwilling to rush yourself.  Yes, you will spend the rest of the night banging John in the closet if it will keep you away from everyone else.  You have zero desire to leave.

Inside your mouth, you can feel your saliva become thick from churning, mixed with the pinching bitterness of precum.  When you moan gently, you hear him gasping.  Must like the pretty sounds you make.  So you oblige him, humming whenever your pipes aren’t stuffed mute with that generous cock down your throat.

“So good,” John sighs, his other hand curling absently around your ear and then falling away with a stroke against your jaw.  You close your eyes just for a moment and wish that maybe his fingers weren’t so soft….

You pick up the pace, pushing John’s hips firmly against the wall while you open the back of your throat and ram his throbbing dick down into it. You’re gonna be sore for a day, you can tell.  But that’s when you take back one of your own hands and curl it around your neglected erection, pumping yourself just shy of the pace you’ve taken on John.

When his fingers pull at your hair and he yanks you all the way off, you tilt your head up and watch his face.  His cum splashes against your lips and cheeks and there’s an errant stripe across one lens of your shades but you’re only mildly irritated.  After all, you did give him permission.  He, panting and flush-faced, chuckles down at you.  You shrug.  And then he pounces.

Your back hits the carpet and your cock is trapped beneath the yet-to-be-quelled erection of John Egbert, which is just fine with you as he gently begins to slurp away the mess on your face.  You rock your hips and tuck your hands at the small of his back as you do, listening to him humming like a porn star.  You take a moment to face the fact that he’s adorable in that eager, slutty way.  You were lucky to even catch such a good break this evening when you thought the world was about to crash around you.  You celebrate by sneaking some kinder kisses between John’s work.  He’s happy to repay them.

You do not, however, possess enough luck for things to keep going the way you want to.  On your back, with residual traces of cum and saliva on your cheeks, John’s tongue burrowing deep into your mouth and your dick still hard up and ready to go, the closet door opens again.  Like the first time, you don’t really care but you should because two seconds later, you’re vacated, looking up at Bro’s face staring stonily down at you.

And you are in so much shit.

“Having fun?” he asks.  Offside you hear John giggle drunkenly and you watch him smear the back of his hand across his mouth.

“I definitely was,” he says, tucking himself back in his pants before going to clean up his box and hide it away again.  You, however, are seized by your collar and jerked up to your feet and then slapped so hard your shades almost fly off.  Luckily, you were predicting it was coming so you brought your hand up to keep the shade-flying from happening.

“Ooh….”

Peanut-gallery commentary aside, you’re still burning with embarrassment and rage and for fuck’s sake, your junk’s still hanging out.

“Bye-bye, Dave.  See ya, Dirk!”  You don’t look at John leaving, but you hear his footfalls as he departs and then his murmuring as you can only assume he decided to make another phone call.

There is silence then.  Just the two of you glaring at each other through tinted glass, breathing heavy while the sting smarts across your cheek and your pride and wrath are folding up on one another to concoct a sicknasty mixture of violent rage.

“You,” he says, voice dangerous, “do not have a choice.”

You never thought you did.  You just knew you couldn’t sit back and take it.  You ran as long as you could.

“Fine way to start out, I give you that.”  He shoves you backwards into the wall.  Your head hits the paneling hard.  “Bravo, you little shit.”

“You done?”

“Not even fucking close.”  He reaches down and grabs your jacket, throwing it to you.  “Make yourself pretty, we’re going to see the boss.”

You can physically feel yourself blanch.

“Now?”

“That got your attention.  Yes, sugartits, now.”  He leaves.  You can’t run anymore; you really don’t have a choice. 

Well, no, you always have a choice and you do now.  But your choices are obey or get massacred.  You choose to brownnose it because that damage is easier to fix than a broken septum.

So you straighten yourself up and make sure your fly isn’t down or anything and leave the closet.  Bro is standing right outside the door to make sure you don’t hightail it and when you look at him, he reaches out and grabs you.  He’s fixing your hair.  You’d be surprised if it were any other occasion, but you know the path you’re about to walk down. He says you still got jizz on your shades so you pluck them off and clean up a bit more before departing.

The party’s still going on.  You can hear the loud drone of conversation echoing about the hallways, humming against the glass of the windows and spilling through the rooms.  But you’re not going anywhere near them.  Instead, you are following Bro to the main hall, where the grand staircase is.  When he begins to ascend it, you realize that this encounter is going to happen where eyes won’t follow.  Anything could happen up there.  With every upward step, you’re adding horrible things to this mental list you’ve begun composing.  Fates that you might meet with.  No matter what happens, you will walk back down these stairs a different person.

You and Bro don’t speak.  And by the time you reach the third floor, all sounds of the frivolity below have been smothered.  Soundproof.  You will be shot and no one will even know.  You’ll be bludgeoned to death without a single scream falling on an open ear.  Your pleas for mercy will reach no one.

The hallways become darker the further you traverse and by the time the lighting is so low, you’re debating whether you should take your shades off, Bro stops.  He halts in front of a pair of doors, ornate and made of solid, dark wood.  You run your eyes over the dual carvings of the family crest and thick, heavy doorknobs. 

Bro knocks.  You swallow everything down.

“Come in.”

The voice makes every nerve in your body jolt.

Bro jerks his head towards the door. This is your show now.  You step forward.  Reach out.  Turn the handle.

Inside is a large room.  Carpeted in red and furnished with teak and brass.  There are many windows, but all with the curtains drawn.  There’s a fireplace, full and blazing and hanging above it is a portrait of a fierce woman with inky black hair and very familiar blue eyes.  Front and center is a large desk and seated in the velvet lined chair behind it is a man.

He wears a black suit and a navy shirt with a slate-silver tie, cufflinks glittering sapphires and at least three gold rings on each hand, including a wedding band.  His salt and pepper colored hair is slicked back, revealing the deep lines of his forehead as he stares at your over his hands folded patiently on the desk before him.  He does not smile.  He does not speak. 

You have not yet begun to grasp just how tangibly terrifying this man is, but you can feel instinctual whispers of it sliding between the goosebumps on your arms and the hairs at the back of your neck.  He stares right through your eyes; your shades are worthless.  It is a miracle you don’t jump through the ceiling when the door suddenly shuts behind you.

You’re almost bowled over by someone passing you.  It’s John.  He just skips right by and goes to the man’s side, standing at his right.  The man doesn’t take his eyes off of you, but reaches an arm out to pat John gently on the back when he comes to settle there.

“This is him?” The voice that bade you enter before is dark.  Smooth like bourbon on ice and deadly like venom dripping from a scorpion’s stinger.

“This is my brother, Dave,” Bro affirms, stepping around you to go stand at some halfway point between you and the man behind the desk.  “Raised him like my own.”

“You’ve done well,” the man says.  Suddenly you feel like a piece of meat, or a muzzled show dog being inspected.  You flick your gaze to John just for a moment.  You figured out early on who he was but you didn’t expect him to be here for this.  You hope to god you’re not going to regret boning him earlier. 

“David, do you know who I am?”

Big man just asked you a question.  You’re afraid if you open your mouth, you’re going to vomit.  You try anyway.

“I know.”

“But this is our first time meeting, isn’t it?”

Oh god.  You’re not sure if you should be annoyed or terrified.

“It is.”

“So allow me to introduce myself.”  He gets to his feet.  You watch as he walks around John, giving him another rub on the shoulder before circling the desk and approaching you.  “I am James Egbert.”  He’s almost as tall as Bro, and that’s tall enough.  “Pleasure making your acquaintance.”  He reaches his hand out.

You shake it firmly, hoping that he can’t tell you’re trembling.  When he smiles at you, you’re not comforted.

“Pleasure’s all mine,” you say.  He chuckles and backs up, giving you another lookover.

“I like this kid,” he says to Bro.  “He’s got your attitude in him.”

“I tried to beat it out of him, I promise.” 

James Egbert laughs.  You don’t think it’s funny.

“You know why you’re here today, David?” he asks after he’s done enjoying the joke.

“More or less,” you mutter.

“Well good,” he goes on, turning back to his desk and approaching John once again.  “John here gets two birthday parties, one for him and one for everyone else.  You have to cater with these people, David, they expect to get invited to every occasion.”  James Egbert takes his son’s chin and tilts it up, smiling down at him with affection.  “Poor John gets so bored when the grown-ups come by.  But he knows that our friends are important to us, don’t you, John?”

“Yes, Daddy,” John says, cheeky grin and everything.

“Good boy.”  James Egbert gives John a kiss on the forehead and then settles back into his chair.  “So I wanted to thank you for keeping John entertained while I was busy with the other guests.”

You’re trying to stifle your rage at being pawned off as an impromptu baby sitter for this guy who’s what…seventeen? Eighteen, maybe? You were under a different impression about this meeting.

“Don’t mention it.”  You only barely manage to unclench your teeth when you say it.

“Of course, I had Dirk bring you down so I could finally get to meet you,” he continues.  “But you went above and beyond my expectations.  I have to admit I wasn’t prepared.”

John giggles quite obviously.  You watch in waking horror as he pulls his cellphone out and waggles it at you with that wicked grin on his face.

“Daddy heard everything,” he says.  “Forgot to end the call.  Whoops.”

Your stomach turns into lead.  You dare to look at James Egbert and see what’s waiting for you there.  But he doesn’t pull out a gun or anything.  Just smiles placidly and says,

“I’d like to thank you.  How about I give you a job?  Hm?  How would like to work for me, with your brother, in the Family?”

No one below would hear you scream if you refused.

And no one at all hears your screaming when you agree.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So…guess what? :D I actually had this chapter finished a couple weeks ago but shenanigans ensued. So here it is now! I realize that this fic was originally dead upon impact but I did some Venetian Voodoo to it and now it’s a Don’t-Get-Attached-To-Me-Because-I’m-Just-Being-Written-For-Shits-And-Giggles-And-Gratuitous-Fucking Fic. :3
> 
> Sooooo…. Yeah!
> 
> -Querel

You step out of the front office and the door slams behind you.  Obviously it didn’t want your sorry ass gracing its threshold anyway.  You only flinch a little; your thoughts are elsewhere and you take a second to remind yourself that you actually have shit to do.  So you better get to doing it.

Your high school is a joke.  All public school is a joke, in your personal experience.  But, hey, show’s over at the comedy club: you just ducked out before that sweating, suburban funnyman could even finish his first setup.  You are out of there.  In long enough to hand in your ticket and you’ve just done an about-face back out of the theater.  You sigh when you walk down the hallway and find your locker.

You drop your backpack to the floor, twiddle in your combination and yank the lock open before kneeling down and shoveling the contents of your own personal stash of crumpled loose-leaf and doodle-filled notebooks into your bag.  There’s a moment as you’re making an unwarranted mess that you remember the face of the woman up at the office when she took your withdrawal paperwork.  She looked at you the same way when you were brought up into the office in handcuffs about a year ago. Like she had always known you were some delinquent. 

Fuck that.  Fuck her.

“Should I call CPS?”

You look up.  Through the dark tint of your shades, you can see Rez hovering over you, her arms folded and her cane knocking softly against the wall of lockers.  Her tone sounds like her usual sarcasm but there’s a set to the tilt of her frown that lets you know that she’s genuinely concerned, though she might never admit to it.

“Nah,” you tell her as you crumple up an empty can of faygo and jam it into your bag too because the whole thing’s going in the garbage anyway.  “That shit doesn’t happen anymore, I promise.”

She scoffs at you and would probably be rolling her eyes if she could really use the gesture as an effective means to convey her lack of faith. 

“And what about me, do I ever get to see you again?”

“You’ve never seen me ever.”

“Are you about to drop off the planet, Strider, or should I save my tears for when I actually have a grave to weep over?”

You shrug, knowing that it does neither of you any good in this conversation.

“I’ll try and keep my phone from getting snatched.  I dunno.  They might give me a new one,” you say to her as you straighten up and haul all your shit up into your arms.  Rez puts a hand on your shoulder and the two of you walk over to the nearest garbage can so you can dump it all.  You sigh down into the can with wads of bubblegum pocked on the rim and something leaking out of the bottom.  Then you take her hand and leave.

“Aren’t you scared?” she asks you.  You laugh because that’s what you do when you’re scared out of your fucking mind and someone confronts you about it.

“What the fuck else am I gonna do?  I tried running away; I got cuffed for truancy and hauled back and then Bro,” you swallow, “…broke everything I owned.  And now I got some pretty sharp eyes looking out for me.  I can’t run.  They’ll find me.  And it’s not like I can call the police.  We’re talking about the fucking mafia here. ”

 The silence slides between you as you walk together.  It’s springtime, it’s warm.  But you can’t help the feeling of ice that seems to be slowly crawling up your spine.  It’s a promise that’s starting to set into your bones.  You shudder without even anticipating it.

“Well,” Rez says to you, gently as you’ve ever heard her speak, “you can always come hide out at my place if you want to duck out on your brother, that’s still an open offer.”

“Thanks,” you mumble.  It’s not much consolation.  You tried doing that once.  But when you came home the next day and saw the look on Bro’s face you decided you weren’t going to skip out ever again.  Truancy was one thing.  Living your life a normal way without him in it was something else entirely.  Beyond an insult, into some sort of heartbreak. 

Call you crazy, but you actually did give a fuck; what a surprise.

You walk Rez back to her house and she actually hugs you goodbye and you don’t cry but you kiss her cheek and tell her that you’ll call her when you can.

And then you go home.

Home is far away.  Far from school and far from everyone else and far, far from that mansion that you have more or less been condemned to.  Home is a shitty one-story duplex that had the dividing wall knocked down and the other door sealed up so it would look like a normal house, but everything’s too symmetrical.  Whitewashed, burnt lawn, crunched mailbox and two kitchens.  Did these people really think they were fooling anyone?

The left side of the house is yours: your bathroom, your bedroom with your closet, and your darkroom.  It was probably meant to be a guest room or an office or something along those lines but you turned it into a place for your photos to develop.  Yeah, technically, you do have a kitchen to yourself, but it doesn’t have anything kitchenlike in it.  It’s just a tiled off section with a card table and a folding chair and a washer and dryer instead of a stove and fridge. 

The real kitchen is on Bro’s side of the house, which is a poor excuse for a kitchen itself.  The stove is one that was probably installed back when the house was built in the seventies, which is fine because it’s never used anyway.  You only go on Bro’s side of the house to get food and then take it back to your dinky card table to eat it, usually by yourself, even if Bro happens to be home because usually, he’s sleeping when you’re up and about.

Not today, though.  Today, when you come home, he is awake, sitting on the couch in the right-side den space, facing the TV, which isn’t turned on, which means that he’s just there waiting for you.  You close the door behind you and lock it with its many bolts and chains.  The lights are all out.  When you breathe in, you start trembling and your pulse picks up until it’s almost the only thing you can think of beside him, sitting there, only a few steps from you.  He’s watching you.

“Got your business taken care of?” he asks you.  You feel like he’s holding a knife against your throat. 

“Yeah,” you answer.  You put your keys and your wallet on the table beside the door.  And then you hesitate before taking off your shades and putting them there too.  You don’t look at him while you unburden yourself and take your time stepping out of your shoes, nudging them into the pile of other footwear that remains heaped by the doorway.  Then your socks come off and you walk them right to the washing machine so you won’t have to worry about them later.

You don’t turn around because he’s standing right behind you as soon as your hands are empty.

“Gonna even let me have a shower today, asshole?” you ask him, somehow managing to keep your snap smooth even though your fingers are starting to tremble.

“Quit being a bitch about it and hurry up,” he says back, the growl of it curling through strands of your hair.  He’s not nearly as angry as he usually is.  He’s gone again; stalked off to the back of the house.  You take a deep breath and let it leave you.  And then you trudge to his room.

Only he’s not there.  You stare at the empty bed and your brow furrows, eyes squinting a little as if you’re trying to make him appear into the space where you’ve seen him many times before.  No…no, you heard him come back here.  He didn’t just duck into the bathroom or something.

And then you realize that he’s not in his room because he’s in _your_ room.  Your heart stutters.

As if you don’t believe your own hunch, you sort of drunkenly stumble to the other side of the house and, sure enough, there he is, sitting on floor—on the _floor_?—of your room, with his hat and shades on your bedside table.  His back is to you as he pulls his shirt over his head and you count the jagged white scars over his stretching skin and muscles.  Too many, that’s how many he has.

He turns a little and you’re tiny in your doorway, watching him sit on the floor as he pats the bedside and you clench your hands, obediently going to sit on your mattress.  Even looking down at him, you’re terribly afraid. There was a time when you weren’t.  When all of this shit was confusing as hell but somehow right.  And then…and then it was ruined.  By him; it was all his fault.

So when you look down at him and you see his eyes doing that thing they used to do back when it didn’t hurt, you’re afraid.

“Bro, what the fuck,” you whimper.  Yeah, your composure shattered as soon as he looked into your eyes.

He breathes in deep and gets to his knees and leans, putting his head in your lap as his hands—they’re bare, he took off his gloves—rest against your thighs.

“I want to…like last year,” he says to you.  You feel like crying.  You bend forward and wrap your arms around his back and press your face against his spine, biting down on the inside of your cheek.

“Don’t…,” you whisper, but can’t bring yourself to finish the sentence because you feel like if you open your mouth again, you really are going to start crying.  And you won’t, you can’t let yourself cry. 

His hands reach and they hold you at your hips, sliding up to latch around your back and he nuzzles at your legs.  Your fingers grip and splay and you touch the tips to his scars and feel them in their jagged crisscrossing.  He’s marked up all over.  You have one scar, which he finds, pushing up your shirt and making you bend back while he crawls up to meet it with his lips.  A sweet little slice out of your stomach where they took out your appendix and sewed you back together again. 

And it speaks to you, that while your Bro has been cut and shot at and ground down and punched, you have only been healed.  Whatever bruises you once had have all faded.  And now his hands are holding you like you’re about to shatter in his grasp. 

You hate it, you hate it, you hate it because it makes you want things like they were before and you know that you can never have that again.  You don’t belong to Bro anymore.  You are now official Egbert property, just like he is.  So even if he decides he’s going to be gentle with you again, he can’t keep the scars from you anymore. 

You hate him, you hate him, you hate him.

He takes your shirt and he takes your pants and he takes your boxers and he gives you kisses wherever he can put them and you hate him.   You try to pull his hair and scratch him and get him to be angry and hurt you.  But he just won’t, that motherfucking asshole.  He just turns you over and pins your hands at your back and kisses you more.  You feel them, warm against your neck and down your spine and against your shoulders; he’s kissing your freckles.  You stare at the wall and give up.

The sound of your legs shifting on the sheets is soft beneath your breathing and his heartbeat that bleeds into your body to syncopate with yours.  You spread yourself and his hand glides up the inside of your thigh and back again, just touching you gently.  He’s being so careful, his touch almost tickles you.  But you don’t say anything.  You just let him.

He pets you and kisses you and doesn’t speak as he does and eventually he feels you’re safe enough to turn over again, he thinks you won’t fight him.  Which is right, because you don’t.  You wrap your arms around his neck and pull yourself up to bury your face against him.  His hands smooth down your shoulders and along your back and he hoists your legs around his hips.

When he kisses your lips, you let your eyes close.  Still so fucking careful…no teeth and only the softest brush of his tongue.  He kisses you like your tongue is something that he can drink from your mouth.  You kiss him like you haven’t in months.  He holds you close and hums against your mouth and you’re so warm…he’s warm against you and you actually dare to let yourself feel safe.

He doesn’t even try to intrude on you; his fingers never go further than the easy downstroke on your cock. You try to just breathe and keep your eyes closed, to just feel good like you haven’t really felt in forever, long enough that you have to try and remember what you’re supposed to feel when he’s careful with you like this.

You shiver and seize and come far too quickly but he doesn’t even laugh at you and he definitely doesn’t get angry.  He pulls every shock from you until you’re almost weeping with them and then he stops.  He leans in.  He kisses you again. 

You allow yourself one sob before you tell yourself to stop.

He actually stays with you the entire night.  And when you wake up again, you are still in his arms.

You don’t stay there; you don’t know how to stay.

You go take a shower instead, thinking about how your arm hurts from being bent against your chest while you were pressed against him and how you really wish you could go back to sleep because you didn’t get many good hours.  It’s early, still a little gray outside, but you probably wouldn’t be able to sleep if you tried.  You’re going back there today.  Bro had promised Egbert that he would bring you back as soon as you were ready to go.  And you’re pretty sure your divorce from a normal childhood education was the last tick on the list of prerequisites to marry the mafia.

When you get out of the shower, you spend a while staring down into the sink.  You have no idea what’s going to happen to you.  Bro had told you months and months ago that this was going to be your life one day.  Which made you scream and fight and run away and subsequently get the shit beaten out of you.  That last part only happened once but it was enough to make you stay put.  That goddamn birthday party was the first time you’d run from him since, your last chance. Your last chance didn’t work.

Egbert had magnanimously decided that because you treated his baby boy _so fucking well_ that he would give you a prized position under him as part of his personal guard.  Which, to you, and probably everyone else, meant that sucking Little Egbert’s cock in the closet wasn’t quite a privilege you had earned and so now you were supposed to be the first one in line to take a knife to the gut the next time someone thought Egbert needed a little extra iron in him.  You think about Bro’s face when your new job title had been announced.  You were probably the only one who noticed—you doubt he himself even realized it—but he obviously wasn’t expecting you to be Egbert’s bodyguard.

He may not have said anything about it but you could tell easily enough that where at first Bro had only a mild resentment about bringing you into the ranks, now he was just completely uncool with it.  You laugh to yourself and think that it was probably because you got vaulted into a position he’d wanted for himself.  What a fucking asshole.  If he wanted to take the bullet for some crime boss doucheface he could fucking jump there himself, not drag you into it.

You breathe in.  Dry off properly and go back to your room.  He’s gone and the bed is no longer warm when you sit down on it.  You get dressed and venture to the living room to get your shades from where you left them on the table by the doorway.  Bro is standing there already and he hands you a to-go cup full of coffee and jerks his head towards the daylight.

You’re going to join the family.

At least Bro remembered to get your coffee made the way you like it.

By the time you pull up to the estate, the overcast of the clouds has brightened a little and it’s actually some sort of warm.  Your cup is empty and your hair is pretty much dry again.  You walk through the front doors and feel like the place is so much more intimidating now that it isn’t overflowing with people.  There is no one to greet you, no one opening doors or standing guard anywhere.  Just this big empty house and you with your hands in your pockets, doing your duckling impersonation behind Bro as he walks you up the stairs back to that office where you first met James Egbert. 

You hunch your shoulders and fit your hands into your jacket pockets while Bro knocks on the door and then you hear the man’s voice again, asking you to come in. 

It’s the same damn room, but the curtains are open now and the silver sunshine eases against all the red and mahogany, making it seem less like a walk-in coffin and more like one of those old libraries, only the warm flavors of old dust have been replaced with scents of expensive wood polish and cigar smoke.  You hang back by the door, rubbing your eyes underneath your shades as Bro walks up to the desk and speaks with Egbert, who’s not looking at Bro, he’s looking at you.  You let yourself look back but that’s only because you know he can’t tell where your eyes are directed.

They talk for a while.  You can’t hear them and you don’t care, even though you feel like your insides are shaking inside of you.  Too much caffeine.  It’s too cold in this damn house.  Don’t these fucking Families have people to build fires in their fireplaces and fucking…keep their beds warm the whole damn day?

“Hey!”

You startle and blink and John Egbert is standing in front of you, grinning.  You scowl.

“Hey,” you say back.

“Daddy, can Dave and I go play?” John asks, turning around to probably bat his pretty-child eyelashes at Papa Egbert.  Your stomach turns over on itself and John grabs your hand out of your pocket.  You would snatch it away if you weren’t afraid of possibly hurting him.  Like fuck you’re gonna let that happen, not right in front of Papa.

Egbert smiles at you.  All of your muscles clench.

“John, your friend is supposed to be having his induction today,” he says gently, like he’s reminding John that he shouldn’t be eating ice cream before dinner.

“Oh, right,” John says.  You can hear him smiling.  His hand holds yours gently because he knows you’re not going to pull away.  His fingers are cold too.  “Can I watch?”

“Of course you can, darling.”  That smile is soft until it turns to you and then it’s like a razor’s edge along every word he says.  “Come here, David.”

When you move forward, John walks with you, unwilling to let go of your hand.  You wonder if you just keep connected with Little Egbert that maybe Papa won’t bite you as hard.  There’s a steel glint in his blue eyes as they watch you that convinces you to think otherwise.  John holds on tighter.  You stand in front of the desk and anticipate. 

What the fuck are they going to ask you to do?  Is he gonna make you kneel?  Gonna start kissing rings?  You think for a horrible moment that they might brand you, but then you realize that your brain just kinda ran with some mafia/cult association that is clearly not a thing that is really real because if it were, you would know it, right?  Bro doesn’t have a brand on him. 

So…what does James Egbert expect from you to do?

John leans against you like you’re his prom date and he’s pressing you for the last slow dance.  His nose nudges against your shoulder and he breathes in gently, humming in satisfaction, like a quiet moan.  Your face fills with warmth as you watch Egbert watch you and he’s just leering at you.  Like, how fucking dare you let his son fawn over you like you’re the hottest shit he’s ever seen.

Fuck, man, it’s not like you dunked yourself in Little Egbert pheromones.

“John seems very taken with you,” he comments, to which the kid hums an agreement.  You feel like smacking this brat because you can tell that Egbert doesn’t appreciate this new development and is much more inclined to be mad at you than at his _darling_ son.  “I can only assume it’s because you took such wonderful care of him the other night.”

“He smells good,” John says.  “Did you see his tongue stud, Daddy?”

God fucking….

“No, I did not,” Egbert says under his breath.  “Mind if I take a look?”

Like you’re going to say no.

It’s a new sort of uncomfortable, standing in front of that desk, opening your mouth and letting your tongue slide out so James Egbert can look at the metal you have stabbed through it.  And when he tells you to lean in so he can see better, you do, putting your hands on the edge of the desk and bending over it just so, John still tucked against you, his nose almost brushing against your cheek.

You have your mouth open for a Family boss.  He smirks gently, tilting his head just staring at your piercing, the drool on your tongue.  And then there’s this sort of sparkling of an idea in his eyes.

“Very good suggestion, John,” he says as you lean back and close your mouth again, feeling like you’re pulling your pants on again instead of just hiding your tongue.  Egbert pulls a note card out of his desk and scribbles something on it, handing it to John.  “You have my permission to take him.  Bring him straight back, understand?”

“Yes, Daddy.”  John leads you back to the door.

“No funny business, now,” James Egbert warns.

“Don’t worry, Daddy, we’ll be good.”

The doors close.  You take the biggest inhale you’ve ever had, breaking the surface of that flood.  You were drowning fast, you suddenly realize.  It was enough to make your ribs feel like they were cracking in on you.  Or maybe that was just John.

He’s let go of your hand, wiping sweat off on his jeans and smirking at you like some stuck-up prince.  You glare at him.

“Mind telling me what the fuck your problem is?” you spit at him.

“Oh, get over yourself, Strider,” he laughs at you.  “You looked like you were about to fall over anyway, I was just helping you stay on your feet.  Honestly, where do you keep your spine?”

“I fucking _smell good?_ ” you accuse him.

“Well, you do,” he admits, “but, did you see Daddy’s face?  He was so maaaaaaaad…he might hit you later.  If he does, make sure you stand still and take it because if you don’t, he’ll just hit you harder.  Come on.”

“No, fuck you.”  You pass him going down the stairs and storm in the first door that doesn’t look like it’ll keep you out.  You happen to have chosen a bedroom.  Looks like a guestroom because everything looks picture perfect and smells a little dusty.  You flop down on top of the bed and stare up at the ceiling.

Of course, John comes after you and you only have about two seconds of solitude before he’s there at the door.  You can’t see him because you’re deliberately not looking at him but he definitely sounds unhappy.

“Hey, look, I was just kidding, he’s not gonna hit you,” John insists, climbing up on the bed next to you.  “But if he catches us here than he definitely will, come on, you heard him, no funny business.”

“Like I’m ever getting my dick anywhere near you again, you spoiled hump-bunny,” you say.  “I’d rather keep it than get it torn off by your dad.  Go fuck my brother, I’m pretty sure we smell the same if that’s what works for you.”

“Oh, Dave, you’re pouting.”

“Fuck you.”

He laughs.  He laughs too much and you know why he’s laughing, so you groan.

“Come on, let’s just go,” he says, grabbing your arm and tugging on you again to try and get you to follow him.

“Not until you tell me where the fuck you’re taking me and why.”  You mean it, you will tie yourself to the headboard with this comforter if you have to.

“Daddy likes to swear in new members by giving them some personalization,” John explains, lying across your chest sort of awkwardly.  Like, not comfortably enough to be intimate but too playful to be comfortable.  “Each member has something that denotes they belong to this Family and what their status is among the other members.  Daddy wants to get you a new jewel for your tongue.  Looks like…,” he pulls the card out of his pocket and glances over the slashing loops of Egbert’s handwriting, “…he wants a sapphire for you.  Which makes sense because the sapphire is our Family’s stone.”

“What does that have to do with my rank?” you ask, unable to draw deep breaths because Little Egbert is crushing your lungs.

“Well, I’m guessing that because the stone will be in your mouth,” John explains, “on your tongue, it basically means you’re Daddy’s bitch.  Maybe not like, his whore or anything, but he definitely owns you.”  John hums while you feel like you’re about to throw up all over him.  “Could be one of two things: either he likes you quite a lot or he thinks you’re dangerous.  Those are the only reasons he’d want to keep you so close.”

“How the fuck could I be dangerous to him?” you mutter, your heart is racing.

“I dunno!  Daddy has his own reasons for things.  He probably just likes you.  He likes Dirk a lot, you know.” John crawls off of you and pulls on your hand again. “Come on, let’s go get your sapphire.”

Well, you suppose that getting some new ice isn’t that bad.  Even though it apparently marks you as the Family Bitch.  You follow John Egbert and start wondering what your brother’s mark of membership is.  You never saw any sapphires on him.  Or diamonds or trinkets.  No unfamiliar tattoos or anything like that.  All of his ink is either about his old life, his ambitions, his accomplishments or you.  And, yeah, he has a frenum ladder and a couple rings in his ear, but those are all boring titanium jewelry. 

What was he given to mark him?

You think to yourself as you sit in the passenger seat of John Egbert’s Ferrari and ignore him whenever he attempts to talk to you.  This whole thing is just fucked up and you hate it.  But there’s a part of you that acknowledges that after a while, it won’t be so bad anymore.  At least, you hope.  God, you hope. 

When you park in front of this local jeweler, you reach out and snag John Egbert’s arm.

“Hey.”

“Yes?”  He grins at you.  You hate it.

“Do you know what your dad wants with me?  Like…what he’s expecting me to do?  Even my brother hasn’t told me anything other than ‘shut up and just do what he wants’ only he’s never said that, he just gives me a death glare from behind those douchebag shades.”

“You’re in Daddy’s guard, right?  Then you just go with him to meetings and stand around until he goes back home again.  If someone tries to hurt him, you hurt them first.  You know how to do that, right?  Dirk told me he’s been training you.”

You sigh a little.

“Yeah.  Yeah, I can do that.”

“Then you won’t have any problems!” John says.   You let go of his arm and get out of the car.

The jewelry store is small but size doesn’t matter when it comes to stores like these.  You hang back and look at a case of watches while John skips right up to the main attendant and hands him the card after listening to a bunch of, ‘oh, young master,’ and ‘delighted to assist you’s .

John comes to join you long enough to ask you which watch you like the best.  And you shrug and point out one that doesn’t look too flashy before the attendant returns and opens a black velvet box in front of you.  It’s a little strange to you that apparently this place stocks sapphire tongue-studs when it looks like it only caters to people who wear strings of pearls and diamond chandelier earrings.  But you just jerk your head in whatever-approval and John says it’s perfect.  He doesn’t pay the man.  Just takes the box and leaves.

“Daddy’s the one who has to put it on you,” John informs you as you’re driving back across town.  “I’m just excited that I get to watch.”

You have a vision of yourself kneeling on that red-rugged floor next to the mahogany desk as James Egbert forces your mouth open and presses the jewel through your tongue, satisfied with your shackle.  And behind him, you imagine John leering down at you.  Somewhere in your vision, Bro is watching too.  You can’t figure out what expression he’s supposed to have.

You give up on the thought and remind yourself that not everything has to be some big production.  This will only matter as much as you let it.

You decide to not give a fuck anymore.


End file.
